From DW Documentary.
For a cow to produce milk, she must give birth to a calf. Female calves later become dairy cows themselves, while male calves are surplus to the dairy industry’s requirements. They’re packed into trucks and suffer in transit on their way to fattening facilities.
Cows must calve once a year to produce milk. However, male calves are unwanted, considered waste products of the dairy industry. They’re often sent to fattening farms, mostly outside the EU. A farmer, a scientist and a butcher want to change this. Instead of sending the animals to factory farms where they’re fattened with soy or corn, the bull calves are sent to the pastures and alpine meadows of the Alps.
Along with a small group of farmers, restaurateurs and retailers, dairy farmer Marcel Renz is trying to change the dairy system in southern Germany. He wants to improve animal welfare, shorten transport distances and produce good quality meat that customers are willing to pay a little more for.
For people who buy their meat from butcher Hannes Hönegger, this is a positive. The butcher works with small, traditional organic farms that rely on what’s known as dual-purpose breeds, animals not bred solely for performance. Here, cows and calves are suitable for both milk and meat production, just as they were in the past. They feed almost exclusively on what grows in the pastures. In this way, they also contribute to the protection of nature in the Alps – from the Allgäu to South Tyrol.
Thomas Zanon’s bull calves are among the lucky ones. No long journeys, no fattening with soya or maize. Instead, they graze on his mountain pasture – a small herd that he’s rescued from the dairy industry. Thomas Zanon’s main job is as an assistant professor of livestock farming at the University of Bolzano in Italy. Taking all factors into account, he says, milk is by no means inferior to milk substitutes made from oats or soya. The rescued bull calves on his alpine pasture are not only happy animals: They also embody a new approach to sustainable milk production.
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